A contentious new study claims that new housing developments in England are badly designed, especially in less affluent areas. However, the damning conclusion contradicts feedback from new home owners, who are overwhelmingly happy with their purchase.
The design of new housing developments in England is overwhelmingly ‘mediocre’ or ‘poor’, with less-affluent communities the worst affected, according to a national audit conducted by UCL for CPRE, the countryside charity, and the Place Alliance.
A housing design audit for England reveals that 75% of new housing development should not have gone ahead due to ‘mediocre’ or ‘poor’ design.
The report, an audit of over 140 housing developments built across England since 2007, found that one in five of these developments should have been refused planning permission outright as their poor design was contrary to advice given in the National Planning Policy Framework.
A further 54% should not have been granted permission without significant improvements to their design having been made first.
Professor Matthew Carmona (The Bartlett School of Planning, UCL) Chair of the Place Alliance, who led the research, said: “Research has consistently shown that high quality design makes new residential developments more acceptable to local communities and delivers huge social, economic and environmental value to all, yet we are still failing in this regard across England.
“Planning authorities are under pressure to deliver new homes and are therefore prioritising numbers in the short-term over the long-term negative impacts of bad design. At the same time, house builders have little incentive to improve when their designs continue to pass through the planning system. Some highways authorities, meanwhile, do not even recognise their role in creating a sense of place for communities.
“Collectively, house builders, planning authorities and highways authorities need to significantly raise their game. This can’t come soon enough”.
However, those living in new developments tell a different story. Home Views, dubbed the Trip Advisor of the new homes industry, gives development dwellers a platform to review where they live. Its Co-Founder Rory Cramer said that, overall, new homes are happy homes.
“We get a lot of reviews from first time buyers who say they were nervous to buy having heard so many scare stories in the press,” he said. “They are looking for independent trustworthy information to help them when making a decision on who to buy with and what questions to ask.
“From our latest data the first-time buyers on HomeViews are rating their new build development consistently with owners who have previously bought. The story is overall a positive one for owners of homes within new build developments.”
The audit also claimed:
- Less affluent communities are ten times more likely to get worse design, even though better design is affordable;
- Low-scoring housing developments scored especially badly in terms of character and sense of place, with architecture that does not respond to the context in which it is located;
- The worst reported aspects of design include developments dominated by access roads and the poor integration of storage, bins and car parking, leading to unattractive and unfriendly environments with likely negative health and social implications;
- Some gains have been made – schemes scored relatively highly for safety and security and were also typically successful at integrating a variety of sizes of house.
Tom Fyans, Campaigns and Policy Director at CPRE, the countryside charity, said: “The Government has presided over a decade of disastrous housing design and must raise standards immediately. This research is utterly damning of larger housebuilders and their failure to build the homes our communities deserve.
“They must significantly raise their game if we are to create the sorts of places that future generations will feel proud to call home. It’s no wonder so many of our communities feel apprehensive towards new development when the design is so poor. That’s why significantly improving the quality of design is central to addressing the housing shortage.”
The audit proposed a range of recommendations for the government, housebuilders and local government. Amongst these the research found strong benefits in designing at higher densities than is the norm, which echoes findings from the Letwin Review of 2018.
“Housebuilders need to drive greater ambition across the sector in order to advance a more ethical approach to the design of development that prioritises the long-term social wellbeing of their customers and the health of the environment at large,” the authors of the report opined.
It also said that local authorities need to use proactive design codes – design parameters established for each site – and design review processes for all major housing schemes.
“Schemes which do not meet minimum requirements should be refused on design grounds and this should be supported, without question, by the government regardless of progress towards meeting housing targets in the area,” it said.
It seems that those looking at new developments are less happy than those who are living in them. Perhaps, when it comes to new homes, beauty really does come from within.
